beesonthewhatnow
going deaf for a living
Indeed. Which is precisely why we need more pedestrianised high streets, cycle lanes, LTN's etc.
Entirely unashamed anti car propaganda, and the more the better.
- Thread starter teuchter
- Start date
David Clapson
Well-Known Member
But you can do that with one cargo e-bike. They take 300kg. Won't be long before they have a supermarket contract.
beesonthewhatnow
going deaf for a living
Yeah, they're amazing. What's even better is how much they wind up idiots (usually taxi drivers) on Twitter who can't get their head around them being both safe and viable.
hash tag
Reaching out
I think we have only ever had two deliveries and both from Morrisons.
Croydon High Street is giving a very good impression of dying on its feet. Heaven knows what it will look like after lock down.
I am hating the new cycle lanes, they have now got those stupid little poles in them. In time they will become dirty and difficult to see. People are already hitting them. There is no where for cars to pull over to let emergency vehicles pass. There is no where for emergency vehicles to stop. All the rubbish will build up inside them because the cleaners can't get inside them..and lo, cyclists still ride on pavements.
beesonthewhatnow
going deaf for a living
If cyclists are still on the pavement then it's usually a sign that the lane isn't fit for purpose. Even now this country is utterly shit at them. Look to The Netherlands for how they should be done.
T & P
|-o-| (-o-) |-o-|
Of course, only it is not as simple as that. A lot of the stuff Amazon delivers is not the kind of wares anyone would jump into a car to pick up. I know plenty of people who will order the likes of a flash drive or a myriad of other non-essential stuff they’re in no particular rush to get simply because they get free next day delivery, instead of popping into a shop in central London the next time they were due to go into (by public transport as well of course).
And additionally, car ownership in larger cities and London in particular is actually fairly low, so the argument that all these convenient doorstep deliveries plaguing our streets nowadays are replacing car journeys is even weaker. A carless person ordering 24 rolls of toilet roll would have carried them on the bus before they got a Prime subscription.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m firmly of the opinion that everyone should do their bit for the environment and their communities’ wellbeing, which should include curbing habits that are polluting or potentially harmful. But there is a massive difference between advocating a more restrained and environmentally conscious behaviour, and demanding any particular habit or trait should be banned outright.
Regardless of whether I might agree with a given argument for an outright restriction or banning, at the very least I would expect any proponent of such nuclear options to be consistent and not self-serving in their criteria of what is allowed or not. If internal combustion engine vehicles are deemed too unacceptably polluting and hazardous to be allowed in a given area, neighbourhood or city, then one cannot demand the banishment of all privately owned cars whilst taking full advantage of other motor vehicles to deliver their shopping or carry them home after an exhausting day out.
That’s why most of the LTN areas that have recently propagated across London are little more than cynical NIMBY exercises. If every single car travelling a local residential streets is ‘a mortal danger to children’, as I have seen them described by LTN supporters before, then I’m sorry but no vehicle at all other than emergency services and disabled blue badge holders should be allowed to enter. Do you live there and own a car? Park it elsewhere. Fancy a taxi home? Get dropped at the boundary of the LTN. All deliveries other than bulky large heavy items? Collect from local shop or post office outside the LTN boundary. Fair is fair. Certainly if one claims one car on their street is one too many.
Needless to say, if such perfectly fair and objective measures had been proposed for LTN zones, the percentage of local residents voting for it would have likely been next-to-fuck-all %.
TLDR summary: we should all towards leading more responsible and environmentally friendly lifestyles, but anyone advocating outright bans on something must either ensure they aren’t benefiting in any way from the very thing they’re demanding others are prevented from using, or GTFO.
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David Clapson
Well-Known Member
Most people won't change their habits without stick and/or carrot. The expansion of ULEZ is a fucking huuuuge stick, and I'm amazed that Sadiq's got away with it. Maybe people who are on the fence, or who say there's no point changing because one person can't make a difference, are relieved and grateful that there's some leadership and the whole community will change at once. I also suspect that many people aren't aware of it. There will be much wailing and gnashing of teeth when the pre-Sept 2015 diesels in London suddenly have to pay £12.50 a day. If it goes smoothly you can bet that many other cities in the UK and Europe will follow suit.
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teuchter
je suis teuchter
These kinds of posts are a depression machine.
David Clapson
Well-Known Member
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
Everyone in London has been on notice for a couple of years regarding older diesels now. It's not going to come as any shock. Anyone who's still running one is either unconcerned because the ULEZ expansion won't affect them, wealthy enough not to care, or an idiot.
David Clapson
Well-Known Member
Just ignore it, it's complete bollocks.
David Clapson
Well-Known Member
Pre-Sept 2015 isn't exactly old. And never underestimate the idiots.
teuchter
je suis teuchter
It's strange that I've never come across motorists campaigning for kerbside parking to be removed anywhere where it means there's only two vehicles' width of roadway left over. It seems that they regard a cycle lane plus poles as substantially different to a row of parked cars.
T & P
|-o-| (-o-) |-o-|
Because they remind you of your own double standards and hypocritical lifestyle, which you'd rather pretend didn't exist?
T & P
|-o-| (-o-) |-o-|
And funnily enough the congestion (and invariably, pollution) has got a lot, lot worse in the last few months since those
beesonthewhatnow
going deaf for a living
*citation needed
teuchter
je suis teuchter
I know some contributors to this thread think the whole "let's get rid of cars" thing is a kind of fringe lunatic thing. They won't be laughing for long. The guys over at railforums.co.uk are already drawing up a list of roads to shut down.
Beeching Plan 2021: roads to close
Perhaps this should be under speculation, mods feel free to move it. Beeching closing railways is often mentioned here, but what about a Beeching Road report, identifying roads that could be closed? Drove by Shrewsbury and Worcester recently after a few years absence, both seem to have bypasses...
www.railforums.co.uk
David Clapson
Well-Known Member
How could people outside cities manage without cars?
Saul Goodman
It's all good, man
Fringe?
8ball
Maximum Facepalm
Cycle lanes have been shown to lead to a proliferation of cyclists.
SpookyFrank
A cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel
So cycle lanes should be got rid of because...drivers can't drive?
SpookyFrank
A cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel
Plenty of people round here park on main roads so as to leave less than two cars' width of roadway. Long term storage of large commercial and recreational vehicles on a public highway is perfectly acceptable for some reason. The extra congestion, pollution and risk this causes is nowhere on the agenda of the hard-done-by motorist brigade.
MickiQ
In My Defence I was left Unsupervised
I hate to burst your bubble but the guys at railforum have the same power and influence as the posters of U75, i.e. exactly none whatsoever
David Clapson
Well-Known Member
The one thing which trumps the right to drive is the right to park.
Orang Utan
Psychick Worrier Ov Geyoor
No, but those poles are shit and counter-productive. Even potentially dangerous IMO
sleaterkinney
Well-Known Member
With the pandemic people are a lot less likely to use public transport, so they get in their car.
Now before the pandemic and LTNs, when traffic was able to flow freely we had congestion and pollution - so where is all that extra traffic going to go?.
LTNs and cycle lanes are part of the solution, give people an alternative to cars. 1/3 of car journeys are less than 2k.
T & P
|-o-| (-o-) |-o-|
If 1/3 of journeys are less than 2k, and even if you managed to convince 100% of those to switch to walking, cycling or public transport, it would still leave 2/3rds of all traffic journeys being longer than that distance, and they far less likely to switch.
The traffic on the stretch of the South Circular directly flanked by LTNs has got unspeakably worse since they were implemented. And that traffic is never going to go away- ever. So all we are achieving is condemning countless amounts of people (the residents along the road as much as the road users, lest we forget) to an eternity of increased traffic fumes and signficantly larger delays, so the lucky residents of some quirky residential triangle get extra tranquility on their already traffic-light streets, while the poor sods living along the main roads, including of course bus users and cyclists endure a semi-perpetual state of chock-a-block traffic. And make no mistake, car traffic will increase not decrese once the pandemic is fully over. Things will only get even worse.
There is a need for reduce car usage and we should aim to do so, but this is not the way to do it. Not when it creates a set of problems on its own and make conditions and quality of life worse for a great many people and is doomed to have a limited effect on vehicle journeys in London anyway.
beesonthewhatnow
going deaf for a living
“This is not the way to do it”.
Let’s hear what is then?
Let’s hear what is then?
